District holds year’s final drumline and color guard showcase

Marina High School in Huntington Beach played host to the Huntington Beach Union High School District Drumline and Winter Guard Showcase on April 29.

For the past few years, the district’s music programs have presented an end-of-season showcase for all of the high school drumline and winter guard teams to perform for each other and for friends, families and the other district schools as soon as the competitive drumline and winter guard seasons are finished.

The six major high schools in the district — Edison High School, Fountain Valley High School, Huntington Beach High School, Marina High School, Ocean View High School and Westminster High School — were represented by drumline and/or color guard units.

Most of the high school drumline and winter guard teams never get to see the teams from other district high schools or their same-school peers perform during the drumline and winter guard competitive spring seasons. Often they compete in different divisions at different sites, they have competitions scheduled at different venues on the same days, or they warm up or put their equipment away and are not present in the audience as the other teams are competing.

The students performed for the pleasure of performing and the audiences applauded each group’s creative efforts and cheered every time a team successfully performed a challenging task.

Edison High School senior and winter guard member Kalie Bartimore said the experience was fun.

“After all the hard work and all the hours we spent, it was really cool just to perform for fun and for our friends and to hear them yell and cheer for us,” she said. “And it was great to see what the drumline did this season and to see all of the other schools’ routines.”

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Edison Hosts Winter Guard Championships

Edison High School Band and Color Guard Boosters hosted 55 Winter Guard units from high schools all around Southern California for the 2013 Winter Guard Associate of Southern California Winter Guard Championships (division A and RAAA) on April 20.

The color guard contest featured rounds in six classes of competition, providing opportunities to compete for units at all levels of experience.

Knight High School from Palmdale began the day with the first performance in the Edison gym at 11 a.m., and Ayala High School of Chino Hills performed at the end of the day at 8:26 p.m. In between, audiences were treated to many wonderful performances from the other guard units and the final awards were handed at 8:55 p.m. that evening. Medals were awarded to the top three finishers in each class.

The following schools took home gold medals that day for their schools: Eastlake High School in Chula Vista, Ayala High School in Chino Hills, Del Norte High School in San Diego, Los Altos High School of Hacienda Heights, Ramona Riverside High School of Riverside and Paramount High School of Paramount.

The Edison Color Guard program titled “Our Dream” was an exciting show performed to the song “Dream On” written by Aerosmith.

The group’s Winter Guard season began in January, where members learned the basics of movement, influenced by ballet and modern dance. In addition to dance, the color guard learned the techniques for spinning various forms of equipment, such as flags, sabers and wooden rifles.

The Winter Guard Associate of Southern California sponsors Scholarship and Service Awards every season and Edison High School senior Erin Smith, who will be attending USC next year, was presented one of the association’s scholarships during the ceremony that evening.

Next on the calendar for the Edison Winter Guard is a fundraiser at the Huntington Beach Playhouse on May 18th. A silent auction and refreshments will be available from 7 to 8 p.m. and the play “Something Funny Happened on the Way to the Forum” begins at 8 p.m. The Playhouse is in the Huntington Beach Central Library and tickets are $30 each and can be purchased from Booster President Maria Toner at (714) 717-7349.

SUSAN DAVIS is a member of the Edison High School band boosters. Her daughter is a junior at the school and a member of color guard.